The BYU Cougars have announced that they will leave the Mountain West for the 2011-12 season and become an independent in football, while joining the West Coast Conference (WCC) for other sports.

BYU originally scheduled to go to the WAC for everything expect football, but canceled those plans when the Mountain West took Nevada and Fresno State.

At the press conference on Wednesday, BYU Athletics Director Tom Holmoe announced that BYU and ESPN have agreed to an 8 year deal with ESPN televising Cougar home games.

The deal will start with the 2011 football season and run through the 2018 season. Terms include one game minimum on ESPNU, while an annual minimum of three games will air on the ESPN family of networks. Any home games not picked up by ESPN will be televised on BYU TV.

In addition to the TV deal with ESPN, Holmoe announced that the annual rivalry game between BYU and Utah (who will be joining the Pac-10) will continue, details on the series should be announced soon. Holmoe also announced that current WAC Members Hawaii, Idaho, Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State and San Jose State, will provide BYU with five games in 2011 and four games in 2012.

Paul

First!!! I really thought that the cougs wouldn’t do this after the collapse of the WAC. They did it anyways and I ahven’t been more excited. I love the deal we made with espn, and I can’t help but feel that even our away games will be broadcast on our own network if no one else picks it up. Imagine that no one is going to pick up the game, and BYU says to your school, we’ll et you in almost everyhome in the country, can WE broadcast it since no one else will? Who would say no?

Joseph Smith

BYU sucks anyway. What a crappy schedule the next couple years! These guys think they’re bigger than they really are. Do they think they’re Notre Dame or something (not that ND is all that great anymore either)? If these guys played a schedule like ND usually does or a schedule comprised of teams from any of the power conferences, they’d be lucky to go .500. I’m so sick of these lame schools like BYU, Boise St., and pretty much the entire Big East claiming they’re just as good as teams from the SEC, Big 12, Big 10, ACC, and Pac 12 when they’re so clearly not. The big 5 conferences should just take over the whole FBS and tell these other conferences and schools to get lost and go to FCS where they belong.